Publisher: Random House (Audio)

Date: March 2011

Duration: 17 hours 0 minutes

Summary:

On a winter day in 2008, Håkan von Enke, a retired high-ranking naval officer, vanishes during his daily walk in a forest near Stockholm. The investigation into his disappearance falls under the jurisdiction of the Stockholm police. It has nothing to do with Wallander—officially. But von Enke is his daughter’s future father-in-law. And so, with his inimitable disregard for normal procedure, Wallander is soon interfering in matters that are not his responsibility, making promises he won’t keep, telling lies when it suits him—and getting results. But the results hint at elaborate Cold War espionage activities that seem inextricably confounding, even to Wallander, who, in any case, is troubled in more personal ways as well. Negligent of his health, he’s become convinced that, having turned sixty, he is on the threshold of senility. Desperate to live up to the hope that a new granddaughter represents, he is continually haunted by his past. And looking toward the future with profound uncertainty, he will have no choice but to come face-to-face with his most intractable adversary: himself.

From the Hardcover edition.

Genres:

Angie Teal

The remarkable conclusion to the Wallander mystery series.
Wallander is at his best resolving the mystery around the disappearance of his future son-in-law's parents. And that despite the fact that his physical and mental health is failing.
I love the rational and almost sombre atmosphere and the lack of drama in Henning Mankell's books. It shows methodical police work without hollywood action.
One of the best crime series I have read.

norasan

The character of Scandinavia -- blunt, unsentimental and supremely rational on one level and yet taciturn on another -- comes through in this closing story of the Swedish detective Kurt Wallander. I was fascinated by the spy mystery, which on its own might not make much of a story, by the way Wallander relates to his daughter and to his daughter's upper-crust in-laws-to-be. I was bemused by the way he manages his emotional life and his health. It's a story without romance, even though a section of it features W.'s grief over a long-ago love affair and the death of his former lover. Refreshingly different.